The Life Swap

by Nancy Weber

LET S SWAP LIVES began the ad Nancy Weber placed in The Village Voice in February, 1973. Thirty-one, a swinging single writer, happy but yearning, Nancy wanted another woman to witness her life from within while Nancy was living a whole new kind of existence loving strangers as her own (including kids, she hoped), doing other work, assuming a different dailiness. She and Micki Wrangler, a psychologist in an open marriage, swapped lives for one tumultuous week. Before reality TV, there was reality and The Life Swap recounts all the intimate details of an adventure often imitated but never equaled.

"This book is the memoir of one of the bravest acts of literary guerilla warfare it has ever been my pleasure to encounter."

Harlan Ellison

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir

262 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[Maureen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to live someone else's life? Nancy Weber didn't just wonder, she decided to actually DO it. This is an intriguing look at what happened when she placed an ad for someone to swap lives with. A very open minded look at life in the 1970's.

[Katherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not like anything else I've ever read.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting as an historical document of feminism in the 1970s.

[Andra Ivanyi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating look into what it was like to be confident, well-off and curious in the mid-70s in Manhattan, free to be deliciously narcissistic during an incredibly narcissistic era. A terrific read about an inevitable "disaster," as the author later called it. Well, of course it was! Our lives are uniquely ours because of a thousand decisions, from whom to marry to which paintings we hang where. How Weber assumed these were details that could be thrown on or off like a coat is beyond me. I didn't get the sense from the book (perhaps later, in essays?) that she understood why her experiment went the direction it did. I don't think she grasped the Great Takeaway -- the uniqueness of the human experience. It can't be replicated. For example, she finds one male character manly and witty, but her replacement rejects him as chauvinistic and repulsive. Of COURSE the dynamic will shift! You can't take the core out of something (a relationship, a person, a LIFE) and expect it to function the same way.

Nonetheless, I admired the verve in her writing, her emotional generosity (that wasn't, sadly reciprocated) and the eager, innocent way she barreled through this era, never really appreciating (or understanding) that the constructs she was testing were in place specifically to avoid this kind of heartache, confusion and loss of purpose. The question shouldn't be "Can we swap lives successfully?" but "How will WE change inside someone else's carefully constructed life?"

Despite buying the book with a sniffy contempt for her self-indulgent thinking (and, I admit, some measure of resentment for the institutions the 70s ideology seeks to destroy), I came to like Nancy Weber. And I really enjoyed this book.

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Compelling

Reading this, I kept wondering whether it was a fantasy written as true life. I was only 12 years old when the events of the book took place, but I have a sense of the time and place. Two women, presenting themselves as intellectuals and forward-thinking, quickly find out that their differences form a gulf that is too broad to breach. The setting, 4 years after the Summer of Love, coinciding with the cynicism of the Watergate summer, show a snapshot of a time and place, of egoism and self-centeredness, that predict the future.

[Melissa Scruggs · Rating 2 out of 5]

What the heck did I just read? So I must admit that after the first chapter I thought about not finishing this crack pot book. I was intrigued by the idea, but the presentation was poorly organized. After trying to cheat and google a summary of the book to appease my curiosity I found out that one of the swappers didn’t play by the rules. It then brought back the curiosity of those “Wife Swap” shows so I continued reading. I could and should have went my whole life not reading this book. I give it a for the intrigue and the facts that it made me pick the book back up.

[Maryka · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my most frequently re-read books - I sat up all night reading it the first time. Musing on what makes each of us who we are, wondering if taking on the environment, work, friends and lovers of another will make her more other than self, Nancy Weber initiated this adventure.

1970s Greenwich Village, a mix of creative and crazy characters, the reactions of Nancy's and Micki's (the swap partner) friends to the experiment, their emotional roller coaster --
all this drew me in to Nancy's world. She has reinvented herself several times since then, but still feels like a good friend to me.

[Talena · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the book my life exchange was based on, it's a really intriguing read. I highly recommend. Fascinating and frustrating. Nancy is a gracious, lovely person today - she hosted the life exchange.